


A Graceful Turn of the Leg

by DwarvenBeardSpores



Series: Legs 'Verse [1]
Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Crack, Legs, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-16
Updated: 2016-01-16
Packaged: 2018-05-14 08:09:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,553
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5736091
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DwarvenBeardSpores/pseuds/DwarvenBeardSpores
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Alexander Hamilton has some pretty awesome legs. So obviously he's going to show them off, right?</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Graceful Turn of the Leg

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by a conversation herebehunters and I were having at 2 am, mostly related to my second favorite tumblr post:
> 
> http://dwarven-beard-spores.tumblr.com/post/135821328496/springbway-half-of-hamiltons-mini-bio-is-just
> 
> I finished this at 4am because I make good life choices.
> 
> (Edit: I fixed the spacing because I prefer it to be more compact, I hope no one minds :) )

Somehow they get on the topic of legs. 

They’re all crammed around a slightly sticky lunch table, swapping stories and sandwiches and making the most of the twenty-five minutes they’ve got together. John is trying to find the expiration date on his milk carton with ever-growing concern and Hercules is daring him to drink it. Adrienne is cramming for an Algebra test. Peggy, who’s supposed to be cramming too, sits on her right, and Lafayette is on her left, involved in a discussion about local volunteer opportunities with with Alex, and Angelica. Eliza is sketching in a notebook as she listens to what is going on around her, and Aaron is reading a book for class, trying to ignore everyone else. 

“What I don’t understand,” Peggy says unexpectedly, “is what makes legs sexy.” It was mostly directed at her best friend, but Hercules reacts faster than Adrienne does.

“What do you mean?” he asks.

“Like, people will be like ‘damn those legs,’ and I mean, they’re legs? I don’t get it.”

She gets a complicated mix of answers. Hercules doesn’t even understand how that’s a question, but he also can’t explain exactly how legs are attractive. Angelica starts going into a rant about Societally Imposed Standards of Beauty. Lafayette whispers in Adrienne’s ear, and makes her blush and nod happily, before he chimes in with “Adrienne has good legs, and you’ve seen _those_.”

The discussion stops when Alex unexpectedly plunks his leg on the table, jeans hiked up to his knee. “ _This_ is a sexy leg,” he proclaims loudly. 

 There is an actual moment of silence.

 “Alex, what are you _doing?”_ Angelica demands. 

 “Gross!” Adrienne pulls her sandwich away from the sudden foot.

 John yelps.

“Hey!” Lafayette says, sharp enough that everyone pauses to listen to what he says next. After a pause, that turns out to be “I mean, he’s not wrong.”

“See?” Alex says. “Peggy, take a look.”

And just like that everyone leans in to check out his calf. It’s well-toned, despite all the time Alex spends writing, but not obnoxiously muscular. Peggy can appreciate how the curve of his calf is nice and smooth, but she’s still not sure why it matters. Eliza spares a moment to stroke the leg. John turns bright red and stays unusually silent, his fingers twitching under the table.

“It would be better if you could see my thigh, too,” Alex says, with no small amount of pride. 

“Not here!”

“I _know…”_

“Alex.” It’s Aaron Burr. It’s probably the first time he’s spoken all week. “Get your leg off the table.”

Alex pouts. “You sure you don’t just want a closer view?”

“ _Put it down!”_

“Oh, come on. It makes a great centerpiece. Right John?” The question is directed at Alex’s best friend, who backs him up on almost everything. This time, though, John nearly chokes on air when Alex addresses him. “Uh, no,” he says quickly. “Sorry.”

Alex’s eyes flick over to John, scan him up and down. There’s no way he doesn’t notice the blush, or the way John is carefully not meeting his gaze. He smirks, and takes his leg off the table. “Better now?”

Aaron answers. “Yes. Thank you.”

Alex retaliates with “you’re just jealous.”

~~~~~~~

“I need to show off my legs more often,” Alex tells Hercules. They have gym together, 6th period, and usually talk to each other while they change. Right now, Alex is in his gym shirt and boxers, jeans around his ankles as he looks down at his own legs.

Hercules shrugs. “I didn’t think they went over _that_ well.”

“Were you even looking at John?” Alex demands. “And Eliza touched my calf!”

“Truly a romance for the ages,” Hercules says dryly. 

“Oh, shut up. After my brain they’re my best feature. Well, I could also talk about my _nose,_ but-“

“Whatever. Fine. So you wanna show off your legs. Do I haveta remind you that there’s five inches of snow outside?”

Alex crosses his arms. “That’s the problem.” He gives his thighs one last admiring glance and starts pulling on his gym shorts. If only he could get away with wearing pants outside of school and shorts inside…

"Hercules.”

“What?”

“I have a plan.”

~~~~~~~

The next day Alex comes to school in cargo pants. As soon as he gets to his first period class, he unzips the bottom half of each pant leg and shoves the extra into his backpack. Voila. Shorts. They’re not _short_ shorts (Alex’s still trying to figure out how to pull that off), but they expose his legs from the knees down and that’s good enough. A little chilly, maybe, but so worth it. 

He’s got first period Calculus with Angelica, and when she comes in he stretches his legs a little, just to show off. 

Angelica stops and stares. “JC,” she says to the student nearest the door, “please tell me I don’t know this guy.”

JC looks between Angelica and Alex, not understanding in the slightest. “You sit next to him and pass notes all the time.”

“I hate you both,” Angelica says, but she takes her seat next to Alex anyway. 

“Morning,” Alex says, a little bemused. “Why are we pretending I’m a perfect stranger now?”

Angelica doesn’t look at him. “I thought you cared about your appearance more than this.” 

“Um, yes?” Alex put _extra_ work into his appearance today. “Are the shorts not enough?” 

“The shorts are the _problem!”_ Angelica hisses. “Nobody wears cargo shorts. Nobody wears cargo shorts in _January._ Alex, you’ve made bad decisions before, but-“ the bell rings and she lowers her voice to a whisper. “This is by far one of the most idiotic.”

Alex opens his mouth to argue his point, but he doesn’t get a chance.  

“Besides,” Angelica adds. “I know you’re just wearing them to impress Eliza and John.”

That shuts Alex up. Well, that and the start of class. But he writes her a few furious notes in between integrals. 

_Excuse you, these are both weather and fashion appropriate._

_And so what if I AM wearing them to be impressive? Are you saying I can’t pull it off? Because I can. You’ll see. They’ll be all over me._

_Or are you jealous?_

Angelica chooses not to answer more than a simple _No. Pay attention._

~~~~~~~~~~

So that was disappointing. The good news is that John is in his physics class, and he definitely doesn’t react as harshly as Angelica did. As a matter of fact, he doesn’t even mention Alex’s curious choice of legwear until Alex brings it up first. 

“Angelica hates my pants.”

“That doesn’t sound pleasant,” John says. 

“What do you think?”

“They’re… fine.” He definitely does not glance under the desk where Alex is slowly flexing his foot and admire the smooth, muscular curve of his calves, the soft-looking hair covering his shins, the graceful way his legs turn as he shifts in his seat…

“Just fine?”

“Yeah.”

The other piece of good news is that John isn’t a very good liar. Alex makes sure to flex his legs noticeably every few minutes throughout the rest of class. 

~~~~~~~~~

“Mon ami, don’t you think you are taking this a bit far?”

Alex sticks his tongue out at Lafayette. “It’s worth it.”

“And you’re not cold?” Hercules asks, dubious.

“Not in the least. And who knows, I might get a date by the end of the day.”

“I am afraid you are… how do I say… a brat.” Lafayette fixes Alex with a stare that knows very well that he used the word correctly.

Alex shrugs. “I know.”

~~~~~~~~

Eliza giggles. She claps her hand to her mouth and her shoulders shake, but when Alex asks “What?” hurt evident in his tone, she just says “I should have known.”

“Known what?”

“That you would capitalize on your success. Yesterday.”

Alex switches from pout to flirt mode in .73 seconds. “So you would consider yesterday a success, then?”

Eliza grins. “I guess I have to.”

“Well, I’m always good for a repeat performance.”

Eliza can’t help but start laughing again. How else can she answer a proposition like that?

~~~~~~~

A sophomore Alex doesn’t recognize stops him in the hall on the way to English. “Well aren’t you the bold one?” she says, stepping close. Her eyes flick from his face, down, and then back up again. 

“That’s me,” Alex says.

“Maria,” the sophomore says, running her foot gently up and down Alex’s shin. He starts to melt a little bit. It feels nice.

The bell rings, signaling the start of a class neither of them is in yet. 

“Shit,” Maria says, and runs off around a corner. 

~~~~~~~

Aaron Burr has an unexpected opinion!

“Why on earth would you think that was a good idea?”

Alex just snickers. He’s never been one to take advice from the guy who almost blew up the chemistry lab sophomore year, and managed to lose his gym clothes seven times the year before that. 

~~~~~~~

There’s enough gossip among Alex’s friend group that Peggy and Adrienne have been caught in the halls and warned before lunchtime. No one outside their friend group seems to care, though. Even if anyone was really passionate what he covered, or didn’t cover, his legs with, Alex has friends now, and they can be downright terrifying if provoked. 

That is to say, no one bothers him until History class, his first class of the day with Thomas Jefferson. Thomas is a special case for a few reasons.

He hates Alex Hamilton more than most people. 

He might be terrified of Angelica and John, but he somehow manages to be both one of the most flamboyant people in the school, and incredibly good at disappearing when unpleasantries come up. (John hasn’t seen him in the past semester, and is still waiting to get a few punches in over a snide remark Thomas made to Alex during the first week.)

He’s also got a level of immunity, because he and Lafayette are co-presidents of the French club, and Lafayette starts crying when his friends fight each other in front of him. (No one wants that to happen, ever.)

And he happens to share this history class with one James Madison. One incredibly smart, quiet, adorable James Madison, who clearly needs to be impressed by Thomas’s bravado. (That’s Thomas’s theory anyway.)

So when Alex walks into history, knees bared to the world, Thomas crosses his arms and leans back in his seat. “Do you see this guy?” he says to James, loud enough so Alex can hear him clearly. “What the _hell_ is he wearing?”

James glances up from his book long enough to view Alex’s attire and decide he doesn’t really care. “Shorts?”

“I mean, who does that?” Thomas meets Alexander’s glare from across the room with a confident smirk. He crosses his arms across the flamingo-print pattern on his shirt. “Kid looks like he can’t even afford a real pair of pants.”

“Oh, shit,” James mutters.

Alex slams his backpack on the desk. “You wanna go, Jefferson? Cause I’ll go.”

Thomas laughs. “Yeah, come on, I’ll kick you in the shins, see how you like that.”

Vanity almost gets the better of him. Alex stands his ground and hurls words instead of punches. “You think you look any better? You’re wearing a _Hawaiian shirt.”_

“Yes I am. It looks good on me.”

“You look like a garden slug that a cheap travel agency vomited on!” About half of the rest of the class laughs.

“You look like an idiot.”

Alex takes that lame retort as a win, but not one that ends the fight. “You’re an eyesore, Thomas, and I’ve been putting up with your questionable fashion choices for what, three years now? Two and a half?”

Thomas snorts. “Not only is that a completely subjective value judgement, you think that means the rest of us want to see your scrawny little legs?”

“You _wish_ you had legs like mine. You’d pad your socks if you thought you could get away with it, make them look like more than the macaroni noodle limbs they are.” Alex isn’t even sure if his arguments make complete sense anymore, but there’s a level of insult that doesn’t _need_ coherency. It’s not like Thomas would understand his cleverest insults anyway.

“You look like you found those in a dumpster. Why don’t you put ‘em back where you found ‘em.”

“And what, streak through the halls?”

“Oh _God no.”_ Thomas makes a retching motion that brings a few chuckles out of the rest of the class. He spreads his arms to include them all. “Look at this guy. Smells like no money, wears _cargo shorts._ ” 

The bell rings, and with the sound comes their teacher, Mr. Washington. Both Alex and Thomas shut their mouths when he fixed them with his steely-eyed stare, and Alex finally took a seat. 

“Alexander, why are you wearing shorts?” Washington asks.

Alex doesn’t miss a beat. “They’ve got a lot of pockets.”

He flips Thomas off when Washington’s back is turned. This isn’t over yet.

~~~~~~~~~

As they were filing out of Washington’s classroom, Thomas remarked to James “Those pants just make him look pathetic. He really should toss them as soon as he can.”

He’s rewarded by a punch to the chest, and a pent-up Alex shouting “I AM NOT THROWING AWAY MY SHORTS!”

~~~~~~~~~~

“I got a detention,” Alex tells Hercules, when they see each other in the locker room. 

Hercules looks less than surprised. For good reason. “I thought they’d relaxed about the dress code,” he says. 

“Not the ‘punching people in the halls’ code though.”

“Ah.”

“I gotta tell John and Eliza to wait for me.”

~~~~~~~~~

They wait.

“Do you think he’ll do it again?” John asks, figuring it’s Eliza… if he can seem invested in the outcome around anyone, it’d be her. 

“I think he might,” Eliza says. “He didn’t seem to regret it when I saw him after class.”

“And I guess if they annoy Jefferson…” John bites his lip. He _still_ needs to punch the guy, even more now. 

“Huh.” Eliza shakes her head. “Alex was insufferable today, even more than usual. But if we’re being honest, I wouldn’t mind if he showed off his legs again sometime.”

And this, John thinks, is why Eliza should be dating Alex. John can’t even admit out loud that he’d like the same thing. Not quite. “I guess,” he says.

“You with me on this?” Eliza asks. She pulls her phone out of her bag and starts messing with it, glancing down now and then but keeping most of her attention on John. 

John is definitely blushing. He almost feigns indifference, but it wouldn’t work. “Sure.”

“Cool. Cause I had an idea.” Eliza brings up a webpage and shows it to John. It’s a webpage that sells cargo shorts. “What if he gets another pair, anonymously? I’m thinking something a little shorter, a little tighter…” 

“I should go,” John says.  
  
“Wait.” Eliza stops him. “We should go halvesies.”

~~~~~~~~

The day Alex wears the new pair of shorts, he causes a commotion, Mostly because the rumor mill can’t decide if Alex has suddenly started dating John or Eliza. 

“I mean,” Peggy says to Adrienne when word _finally_ gets around to the freshman hallway, “He’s got a leg for each of them.”

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I as the author don't actually hate cargo shorts, but I am endlessly entertained by Alex's desire to wear them.
> 
> For those wondering:  
> Seniors: Angelica, Hercules  
> Juniors: Alex, John, Eliza, Thomas, James, Aaron  
> Sophomores: Maria  
> Freshmen: Peggy, Adrienne
> 
> (I figured out the other day that in real life Peggy and Adrienne are only one year apart. Also I definitely ship them now. With any luck they will get their own fic soon)
> 
> Edit: I forgot to mention, you can also find me on tumblr as dwarven-beard-spores !!


End file.
